Germany is putting the rest of Europe to shame

A woman holds a picture of German Chancellor Angela Merkel as migrants set off on foot for the border with Austria from Budapest, Hungary, September 4, 2015. REUTERS/Bernadett Szabo

Europe is in the middle of a massive migrant crisis. Hundreds of thousands of people are fleeing Syria and Africa.

Germany is welcoming many of these refugees and migrants.

German officials have promised the nation could take half a million Middle Eastern and African refugees every year for "several years," the Guardian reports.

"I believe we could surely deal with something in the order of half a million for several years," the country's vice-chancellor, Sigmar Gabriel told ZDF public television, per the Guardian. "I have no doubt about that, maybe more."

That announcement comes after Germany said it will spend roughly $6.6 billion on the more than 800,000 who will have entered the country by the end of this year, according to the Associated Press.

Last week, photos surfaced of Aylan Kurdi, a three-year-old Syrian refugee who drowned while attempting to cross the Mediterranean from Turkey to Greece, intensified the worldwide discussion on how to handle the influx of refugees. Kurdi, his brother, and his mother are a part of the growing statistics, now at more than 2,500 refugees, who have died while crossing the Mediterranean trying to reach Europe, according to the United Nations.

As Kurdi's body was being discovered, Hungary had just shut off its main rail station specifically so that refugees attempting to get across the European Union would be stopped. Last night, Greek police clashed with refugees and large crowds gathered on the nation's Macedonian border.

"If Europe does not take steps as a whole, the current situation is worrying for free movement at the heart of the EU," Matthieu Tardis, a migration expert based in Paris, told AFP last week.

"We had to give a strong signal of humanity to show that Europe's values are valid also in difficult times. Hungary's handling of the crisis is unbearable," said Secretary General of Germany's Social Democratic Party Yasmin Fahimi, per NBC News.

Gabriel said fellow European nations must also accept their share of refugees, but so far, no nation is accepting anywhere close to the number of asylum seekers as Germany.

"This joint European asylum system cannot just exist on paper but must also exist in practice - I say that because it lays out minimum standards for accommodating refugees and the task of registering refugees," German chancellor Angela Merkel said in a news conference.

As to why Germany will be taking in a much larger share of asylum-seekers, Gabriel said it's "because we are an economically strong country, without doubt."